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Wells Fargo’s average loans tumbled in the second quarter as consumers and businesses, buoyed by pandemic stimulus programs, refrained from more borrowing.

Fiscal restraint, the reversal of enormous amounts of monetary stimulus, smarter regulation and job retraining are among the public policy steps that could interrupt the long U.S. tradition of boom-and-bust cycles.

Income from stock trading and investment banking trounced analyst estimates in the second quarter and made up for weaknesses in the company's much bigger fixed-income and credit card divisions.

The company fell short of net interest income projections as loans and leases in the consumer banking unit dropped 12% from a year earlier. However, loan balances grew from the first quarter — the first sequential increase in a year.

The president has a chance to make his mark on the central bank as the terms of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell and Vice Chair of Supervision Randal Quarles near their end. He will face pressure from progressives to pick reform-minded leaders, while moderate Democrats and Republicans in the narrowly divided Senate might favor reappointing Powell.

The credit card issuer’s move will increase the pay of more than 5,000 employees. Numerous banks have recently raised their minimum wages in a competitive labor market.

While customers of the nation’s largest bank are spending more, an unusually small percentage of their purchases are becoming debt. Executives warn that the bank’s predicament could persist for the rest of the year.

Citigroup will let retail customers bet on stocks without paying fees as the bank tries to expand its wealth business in the face of fierce competition from Silicon Valley ventures, discount brokerages and big-banking peers.

PNC, Regions and TD are among the banks that have taken steps to reduce their reliance on charges that disproportionately hit consumers living paycheck to paycheck. The changes come at a time when the Biden administration is expected to take a tougher stance on overdrafts.

JPMorgan Chase’s investment bankers posted their best quarter ever as a record first half in dealmaking bolstered the bottom line at the nation’s largest bank. But expenses climbed in the second quarter and loan growth remained out of reach.

The card network and telco are designing systems that use 5G to support more payment processes hosted in the cloud rather than on local hardware. The goal is to make services such as autonomous checkout available to small businesses.

Fintech companies with narrow-purpose banking charters pose a safety-and-soundness risk and should be denied access to the payment system and other perks unless they meet the same strict regulatory criteria as traditional financial institutions, trade groups for banks and credit unions told the Federal Reserve.

Citigroup plans to exit Venezuela by selling its remaining business there, ending more than a century of operating in the South American country.

The bank is piloting fingerprint-reading cards that work with existing payment terminals. Its goals are to strengthen security for large transactions and to inform future deployments in other markets.

Though the Paycheck Protection Program is winding down, the Small Business Administration has prolonged several other pandemic relief programs. Community banks can help local businesses sort through their options.

Rosilyn Houston will succeed William Wolf, who is retiring this summer from Banco Santander’s U.S. unit.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen signaled she’ll prod multilateral development banks to rein in their lending for fossil fuels, part of a global effort to make the financial system greener.

Income share agreements, which allow college graduates to repay tuition financing as a percentage of their future income, have come under fire lately from consumer advocates for questionable marketing and other potential legal violations. Some hope a partnership between a Virginia bank and an ISA provider will give the product more legitimacy, while others worry it just masks risks for borrowers.

The card issuer, which is offering its customers a chance to purchase non-fungible tokens created from a recent performance by the singer SZA, is betting that the digital art-trading phenomenon will become more mainstream.

HSBC Holdings’ streamlining drive has reached its top executives, with the bank promising to shake up a “hierarchical culture.”